PSA Bible Reading Challenge 2023-2024

Will you just read vs.10 and tell me what you think.  I love to think of the marriage of righteousness and peace.  So think about it.  You can have peace in a nation but if the ruler is a despot and a dictator then it would probably mean that righteousness is not a part of the picture.  Conversely, you may have the most righteous ruler who is a lover of all humankind, but if there is not peace in the land, then you will have war.  But, when peace and righteousness kiss, you get both and the ideal rule takes place.  

Don’t get me wrong, we do not live in a theocracy, but I’m not sure if I wouldn’t want to.  What I mean is that I think I might want to live in a Christian theocracy.  Israel was a theocracy which meant that the king also built the temple and encouraged the people to worship.  I think people in our nation want to live in a theocracy, as long as the theo (god) who is worshipped is the Christian God.  Our nation was founded upon the freedom of religion.  This does not mean a Christian majority, it means that you are free in this country to serve and worship the god that you want to.  

IF you are someone who complains that there isn’t prayer in school, or that as Christians we are persecuted in this country, then I would invite you to rethink the way this country was founded.  It was not founded for Christians, it was founded for refugees who would be able to worship the god that they wanted how they wanted.  I love our country because of this history, but I wonder what people expect when I hear folks complain that Christians are no longer the favored ones.  We were never meant to be.  

This song reflects the words of this psalm.  We used to sing this in Moscow when we had a jazz pianist as our accompanist.  You never were sure where it would end up, but the words never changed.  Better is one day in our courts than a thousand elsewhere.  

In encourage you to listen to this song and follow along in the psalm and I think it will speak to you.

For some reason this song comes to mind when I read this Psalm.  

I think it is because this Psalm is a walk down memory lane of when God came to the rescue of Israel against some of the fiercest foes.  You notice that the author does describe and call out by name those enemies.  I hope you also noticed that there were 10 enemies which are listed.  The number 10 is not one of those numbers that is used consistently in Scripture like 12 or 3 or 7, but it is one that is used often enough for us to know that it basically represents all of the enemies of Israel.  

So when we get to vs.13 we know that when he says: “Make them like whirling dust”, we know that he means all of the nations when he says “them”.  Some of the victories described in this psalm are some of the greatest victories that Israel ever had.  What are some of the greatest victories that we may have had as a nation?  When we talk about D-Day, we know that it set the path for a victory in WWII, but do we remember the slaughter that took place where so many of our troops were decimated?  The Psalmist certainly lifts that up as a reality which they faced even with the victories which are recounted.

It is always a bit disconcerting when you read about God taking his place among the other gods.  It almost sounds like it gives credence to the fact that there are other gods.  Remember where Israel found itself as a people and as a nation.  We do not live in a culture where on every street corner there is a figurine or a statue that is thought to have power because it is somehow a god who oversees and protects.  That was the reality of the psalmist, he lived in the midst of people who had their own family gods.  Remember Laban who pursued Jacob because Rachel had stolen the household gods? 

We also see earlier on in Genesis 6:2 a verse that I have never understood.  Is a pastor supposed to point out verses they don’t understand?  Anyway, this whole reference to me serves as reminder that there are people out there who believe so radically different than we do.  The terminology that we use: salvation, grace, redemption, sacrifice, etc. is so comfortable and familiar to us that we often forget that when people step into the church it almost sounds like a different language to them with its own vocabulary.  

But what people will recognize and appreciate is the fact that the God that we serve, and I will maintain that He is the one and only true God, is concerned and cares about the weak, and the orphan, the lowly, and the destitute.  As long as we share the same concern as our God, then people should be able to see the light of Christ in us.

It is interesting that in this Psalm it seems that the voice which is used to depict the speaker is that of God.  More often than not it is the voice of the psalmist who is pleading to God for one reason or another.  Here, instead, the author takes on the voice of God.  This is true especially starting in vs.6 through the end of the psalm.  

The reference to the waters of Meribah is a reference to Exodus 17 which describes the Israelites and their demand for water.  The places Meribah and Massah mean quarrel and test respectively.  This psalm reflects the quarreling and the testing that the people of Israel were responsible for in respect to God.  It is a psalm of lament not of the people against God, like it usually is seen in the psalms, but rather a lament of God against the people, like is seen in the prophets and other places.  I like the way which God trades places.  It is absolutely justified in this situation.

God is called the Shepherd of Israel.  What a wonderful title.  It is not a foreign one in the psalms as arguably the most popular psalm, 23, we find that same title for God.  The shepherd is the one who leads the sheep.  The Gospel of John tells us that the shepherd knows his sheep by name.  But not only is God given the title of shepherd, but also in Scripture, and in real life, shepherd is also a title given to the religious leaders of any given group.  When you are in Italy the name for pastor is “pastore”, which means literally: shepherd.  When we served in Italy I was a colleague to many German Shepherds (see what I did there).  But it is true, we also find that same reference in Scripture when we find God’s Word refer to the shepherds of the day and it was in reference to the religious leaders.  

Unfortunately, Scripture is not often kind to them.  Look at Ezekiel 34 and Jeremiah 23 and the prophets speaks out strongly against the “shepherds” that have failed the Lord by seeking after their own desires.  We see that same problem happen in I Samuel when Eli and his sons were priests, his sons were only seeking out their own interests.  We know full well that Jesus is the only good shepherd.  We also see him saddened because the people on the sermon on the Mount seemed as sheep without a shepherd.  That is a sad place to be.  But God chooses the shepherds to lead His sheep.  While Jesus is the only good shepherd, it does not remove the fact that God has chosen shepherds, pastors and religious leaders, to lead His sheep.  He can only use what is at His disposal, and that is us.

There are so many references to sheep in Scripture: the lost sheep, the good shepherd, a sheep at the slaughter, and a myriad of people of faith in the Bible who were shepherds: Moses, David and others.  

So this is one of those psalms that if I had to choose this one from which to extract the Call to Worship on Sunday morning it wouldn’t be until the very last verse that I would find something suitable.  We once again find the author speaking through one of the most traumatic times in the nation of Israel, the destruction of the temple.  The detail which we find in this psalm can be disturbing.  We find bodies lying unattended left to rot by the enemy.  We find bodies posted as signs to any who would come near and try to conquer the victors that this too could happen to you.  The author asks the Lord to come to their rescue.  We don’t find that rescue comes about, but at least in vs.13 we find a promise.  God, if you come and rescue us then I promise we will tell our children that you have rescued us.

Wait, hasn’t the Lord rescued them time, after time, after time?  What makes this one time any different from the myriad of times that God has come and taken Israel close to his bosom and said: You are my people?  Why would Israel forget what God has done in the past right in the midst of a time when they need to remember it the most.  Isn’t it true that in the midst of crisis we forget the good that God has done for us.  It is in that time when we need to remember it the most.  

I really hope you were able to read through this psalm in one sitting.  It is powerful.  The entire premise is built around vs.1-4 where the author states that we will not hide, we should not hide, all the glorious deeds of the Lord from our children.  We have to pass on the memories of God’s actions in our midst to our children.  I also think of:

A scripture which is a classic which reflects what this author is trying to say at the beginning, that we will never forget to tell our children of the wondrous things of the Lord, is called the Shema which is found in Deuteronomy 6:4.  It is called Shema because that is the Hebrew for hear or listen.  In the Shema we find the author telling his audience of how crucial it is for the next generation to hear and understand what God has done for the nation in the past.  The passing down of the faith from one generation to the next is crucial for the Israelites, and equally crucial to us.  At least it should be.

Once vs.4 is over do you see what the author does?  He launches into a reflection of what God has done, and specifically what God has done in relationship to the time of Israel in Egypt.  He goes through the plagues, he goes through the people being led out and crossing the red sea.  He goes through the continual betrayal of the people time after time.  It sounds like the book of Judges where we hear consistently and constantly: “And the people did what was evil in the sight of the Lord.”

This Psalm contains one of my favorite references or metaphors for the Lord.  Look at vs.65 where the author basically compares God to a drunken sailor.  Do you see that?  Like a soldier who wakes from his stupor after a long night of drinking God comes to the battle and slays the enemy.  Not one I would use often in my sermons, but effective and it gets the point across.

My mind is focused upon what I’m going to be sharing tomorrow in church so it is hard to get away from the message of claiming our faith as our own.  In the first 10 verses of this psalm you have the author lay out reasons for why he is struggling with his faith.  He can’t sleep, he calls upon the Lord and doesn’t hear an answer, his doubts start to rise up.  

But then in vs.11 we see that he remembers the deeds of the Lord.  Hosea is frustrated in chapter 6 because of the fickleness of the faith of the people of God.  While the faithfulness of the Lord is never ending, our faith is like the dew in the morning.  Once it feels a little heat then it burns off.  the rest of the psalm is a recognition that God is the man.  It takes us a few verses in our life to sometimes get to the point where we recognize that God is the man.  We have sleepless nights and times when we wonder where God is and if the Lord will spurn us forever.  

Once we build up enough experiences and begin to trust completely that God’s faithfulness will never, ever disappear, then we can look toward the future without fear.

This feels like a psalm of celebration over a conquest.  There is no complaining, there is no asking God for help because things are getting noticeably out of control.  It seems more of a celebration of God’s power and might which had just recently been experienced in the author’s life.  It makes we think of this song.